Presentations are important. It is as simple as that. Every sales team has to prepare presentations, they are almost impossible to avoid in the marketing world. Their importance and inevitability can often make them daunting tasks. Yet, the trepidation that many salesmen approach presentations with is matched by the rewards that they offer. There is no other single operating platform from which a sales team can so effectively build corporate image, relationships and sales.

The potential for reward is also matched by the potential for disaster. Whilst the most likely outcome of a poor presentation is not making a sale, it is also possible to damage your corporate reputation with a bad performance. It is for this reason that many fret over impending presentations. Today, we're going to look at how preparation can help minimize the stress of this process.

Preparation

Good preparation will put you in a position of confidence about your material. One should not, however, confuse good preparation with spending every waking hour worrying about it. There is a risk of spending too much time preparing, obsessing over the tiny details. This can often convolute a perfectly good presentation and it is a tendency that should be avoided. As a rough time guideline, a ratio of 12:1 is frequently cited. This ratio prescribes that you should spend 12 hours preparing for every one hour that you present.

Initial preparation should be characterised by the questions that you ask. Ask yourself relevant questions like the ones listed below.

• Who are we actually meeting?
• What is their agenda/requirements for the project?
• What values are they looking for?
• What is essential and what is nice but non-essential?
• What are their roles and responsibilities?
• What additional value can we add?

After preparing a list of questions, set about answering them. There are a variety of tools that one can use to answer these questions like:

• Web research
• Their own marketing material
• Telephone research – call them/other colleagues
• Check projects they have done before

These steps should provide you with information that you need to tailor a presentation directly to the people who you are going to be meeting with. With this information, work with your colleagues to build the presentation.

• Allocate responsibilities for the opening, close and main sections
• Prepare the opening, the content and a summary. Prepare documentation, PowerPoint slides/etc.
• Research and understand the project in some detail
• Talk to others who have faced the same problems
• Research solutions on the web
• Discuss in depth to anticipate problems and develop solutions
• Check practical matters - visual aids/is a projector required?

Above all, work on individuality. For people who see presentations all the time, there is a tendency for them to blur into each other. Avoid this if at all possible. Attempt to inject a flavour of individuality onto everything that you do, so that it will stick better in the minds of others. Finally, before going into a presentation, practice, practice, practice.